


Calcu-Mei-tions

by Regularity



Series: Overwatch: Mei Missions [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-26
Updated: 2019-06-03
Packaged: 2019-11-06 01:11:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 18,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17929922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Regularity/pseuds/Regularity
Summary: The newly-reformed Overwatch, still secretive and running missions without governmental oversight, has tasked a small team with scouting out an old Ecopoint in Chile. They are looking for supplies and equipment they can use, as well as any old data stored on the local servers that may help highlight ecological issues.Mei-Ling Zhou, having reconnected with Winston and Overwatch, is the leader of this team. She feels unprepared to lead and a bit like an outsider to the familial bonds the others have, but she is going to do her best and hopefully find some useful intel.Reinhardt Wilhelm, Fareeha "Pharah" Amari, and Brigitte Lindholm round out the team, and other familiar faces will join the fray before the mission is complete!





	1. I'm Just a Scientist

**Author's Note:**

> You can follow me on Twitter @rick_cook_jr to get updates and impending posting schedules for Mei MIssions, and my other longfic Carol Danvers AU. Follow to get random musings on fics I'm writing, or fics I'd like to write!
> 
> https://twitter.com/rick_cook_jr

_ Entry 24 - January 12, 2076 _

_ We are almost at the coast. Winston said something about the ship not handling the heat, so we are landing there and driving inland to the Ecopoint. I’m a little nervous. How am I supposed to tell Reinhardt what to do? What if I make a bad call?  _

_ I don’t know exactly what we’ll find at Atacama, but I hope it will help. There are many things to do and not enough of us to do them.  _

_ I look forward to getting to know the new Overwatch. It’s not every day you meet children of the heroes you aspired to be like, trying to be their own kind of useful. We all must do our part. _

 

The dropship flies low over the water as a flock of kittiwake swarm the waves, picking food out of the water. Mei busily strips her coat down to a blue tank top and checks to make sure her companions aren’t around, then changes into some white khaki trousers and black boots. Snowball watches the steps down and titters in warning just as Mei is tightening the laces on her boots.

“Hey, Mei, I’ve got that patch you asked--” says Fareeha as she strolls in and stops. “Oh, you look different.” Her slight Egyptian accent was difficult for Mei to parse at first, but she’s gotten used to it. Nothing like her own thick Chinese. 

Mei grabs an old Overwatch jacket from a locker, which is a little too small for her bust and waist, and pulls it over the tanktop anyway. She fights a blush and fails.

Mei says, “Winston told us it would be over 40 degrees in Atacama. I can’t very well go out in my polar parka, can I?” 

Fareeha “Pharah” Amari shakes her head, grinning. “I suppose not. Here.” She hands over a patch, of a rare Pachimari variant, Pachimummy, where the tentacled turnip is covered in mummy wraps. Mei squeals with delight when she sees it. “I knew there was one around here somewhere.”

Mei reaches out to hug Pharah, then realizes they don’t know each other well enough for that, and instead drops her arms awkwardly. Pharah isn’t even part of Overwatch; she just kind of attached herself when she spotted Reinhardt in a crowd. 

“Thank you, Pharah. I will cherish it always,” Mei says and Pharah coughs uncomfortably. 

From down in the deployment deck Reinhardt yells in his thick German accent, “We are approaching the drop zone!”

Over the intercom Brigitte’s Swedish lilt says, “For the last time, use the intercom,  _ Gudfader _ .”

“The intercom doesn’t carry the same weight as my booming voice,” he declares. 

Mei and Pharah look back up from the steps down to the deployment deck, back at each other, and share a longsuffering grin. Pharah says, “At least he’s excited.”

“Now if only he will listen to orders,” Mei mumbles.

Pharah puts a hand on Mei’s shoulder and squeezes gently. “You may not be a soldier like the rest of us, but you’ve got something better than a rocket launcher.” She taps the side of Mei’s head. “The knowledge we need to rebuild.”

Mei looks away from the soldier, stumbling over her thanks. “I’m going to the cockpit to see how Brigitte is doing.”

“Maybe tell Reinhardt to finish putting his armor on,” Pharah says. “It takes twenty minutes with help.”

Mei grins and heads down the steps into the deployment deck, where Reinhardt is looking out the window. He’s graying, grizzled and wartorn, but the expression on his face is only of anticipation, of excitement. He’s glad to be of use, to be official, even if unofficially.

“Reinhardt,” Mei says quietly, then screws up her courage when he doesn’t seem to hear her. She clears her throat. “Reinhardt.” The man turns and regards Mei.

He says, “Are you ready for the desert, snow queen?”

Snow queen? “I guess so. If you don’t mind, could you finish gearing up? I’d like to depart as soon as we land.” Snowball nudges her elbow, and she hesitates, then salutes. Reinhardt salutes back and seems pleased with the encounter.

“I’ll get Fareeha’s help; she’ll hate it.” He grins and yells for Pharah, who yells right back at him. Mei leaves them to it as she heads up to the flight deck and the cockpit. 

Her whole team has a history, a legacy. Mei was just a climatologist in a remote Ecopoint, serving as data collection and analysis, when Overwatch was functional. They’re all combat-ready, trained. They’ve lived life in the past decade. They’ve made memories.

So why did Winston put her in charge?

Up the steps to the flight deck, Brigitte is at the controls. She does not appear to be actively flying the ship, though; she’s got her hands on her shield, tinkering, while the auto-pilot carries them to their destination. The youngest by close to a decade, Brigitte served as squire to Reinhardt during his knight-errant years. Daughter to Torbjorn, Mei can hardly believe. She’s so tall, and handsome, and soft in all the ways Torbjorn is not. And yet, as she pokes and prods her little shield device, Mei knows it must be true. 

“Everything all right up here?” Mei asks.

“Blue skies and apple pies, Leader. We should be touching down in fifteen or so.”

Mei nods, looking at the monitors on the cockpit’s console. “Do the scans show any signs of activity at the Ecopoint?”

Brigitte sets her shield down and sighs. Mei tries not to take it personally. Brigitte looks over the monitors and runs some calculations, then shakes her head, her long braids bobbing.

“There was a blip about an hour ago, Winston’s analysis determined it to be animals. Probably desert snakes.”

“Snakes? I hope we do not come into contact with them.”

“You can just flash freeze them with that fancy gun,” Brigitte says.

Mei shivers, hand instinctively going to the new holster she designed. The apparatus, not a gun, is a comforting weight, but she hasn’t used it against living creatures. She hopes she won’t have to.. “I wouldn’t want to hurt it. They belong here and we are just visitors.”

Brigitte nods after a moment. “We’re touching down in ten.”

“I will make sure the rest of the team is ready. Can you drop the rover on approach to save time?”

“Easy as winning a bet that Reinhardt charges into battle.”

Mei smiles. This is Brigitte’s first mission with the newly-reformed Overwatch. Her first deployment as part of a team instead of just helping Reinhardt slay dragons in small European towns. Mei hopes she is as confident as she projects. As capable.

“Let me know if something changes, all right?”

She heads back down, Snowball warbling in front of her, and finds Reinhardt securing the last of his chestplate with Pharah’s help, who shoots Mei a longsuffering glance.

“I bet you never asked my mother for help,” she says, slapping the armor into place and going over to put on her own. 

Reinhardt laughs uproariously. “I learned never to ask that woman for anything but a cup of tea.”

“Her  _ saiidi _ was unrivaled,” Pharah remarks. Her fingers graze the Eye of Horus tattoo upon her face, and she slows while strapping her armor on for a moment before rousing from some memory. “I will make us a pot when we get back to Vancouver. Least I can do before heading back to Egypt.”

“I look forward to it,” Mei says. She looks out the window on the door and admires the scenic vista of the rocky, sandy coastline rushing up to greet them, appearing to consume the aquamarine waves of the ocean. They fly in low and the tow cables detach, dropping the rover, while Brigitte calls over the intercom, “Strap in, landing in sixty.”

The three of them grab hold of the netting in the deployment deck, and the dropship swings around, its thrusters picking up speed and volume, before it cradles in the sand a kilometer up from the beach.

The hatch hisses with hydraulics as the pressure normalizes inside and out, and the door lowers to become a ramp, coming to a soft  _ whump _ in the sand. 

Mei stands at the threshold, unsure how to be a leader. Brigitte comes down from the flight deck, making last second adjustments to her flail, flipping her braid over her shoulder, high-fiving Pharah, and nudging Reinhardt. They know each other well. They trust each other. 

They look at Mei expectantly.

Snowball bounces up and down in front of her, an odd little Ecopoint assistant, and his digital readout shows happy eyebrows as he launches up and docks into her battery pack, making digital coos.

At least someone trusts her. Has faith.

Mei turns to stare at the landscape, at an Ecopoint too far out to be seen. Sand, and cliffs, and a shocking variety of colorful plants greet her.

She sucks in a great breath of air, stands tall, and says, “The mission starts now. Let’s go.”

Mei doesn’t turn to see if anyone follows her as she takes her first step onto the sand.


	2. Step Into My Parlor...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Previously, Mei and her team of Reinhardt, Pharah, and Brigitte were on their way to an Ecopoint in the desert, to look for intel and supplies. They have just arrived at the beach and now are making the trip overland. Arriving at the desert facility seems calm enough...

They take off over rough terrain, first the gritty wet sand of the beach, then the desert scrublands of Atacama*. Brigitte drives the rover, and Mei sits in the passenger seat. Reinhardt takes up the entire back seat by himself and his hammer, and he dozes lightly. Pharah equips her long-range jets before they depart, and she follows forty meters in the sky and a dozen meters or so back, calling out landscape shifts and anything else through their comms.

“Team Rocket Pop, report,” Winston’s voice asks through their comms. It is a little scratchy and distant, probably because they’re relying on satellite relay from the dropship. Mei groans at the team name Winston gave them, but the others seem to think it’s hilarious, and she doesn’t want to start off by dissembling.

“Mei, reporting in,” she says. “We are ten kilometers out from Atacama. Pharah is eye in the sky, nothing unusual so far. And also Reinhardt snores louder than he yells, somehow.”

Winston chuckles. “I’m not picking up any signals or traffic via satellite, but all the same, who knows what’s out there in the desert. Atacama was decommissioned five years ago, and we can’t be lucky enough to be the only ones to notice it might be a treasure trove.”

Mei says, “Sometimes you just have to put your faith in the mission.”

Brigitte nods from the driver’s seat, and Winston says, “Keep me updated, Rocket Pop. HQ, out.”

Mei stifles another groan. She asks Pharah through the comms, “Are we almost over this hill?” They have been traveling steadily inclining scrublands since leaving the coast, and the only thing in the distance they can see are some snow-capped mountains. With how hot it is, snow seems unlikely, but then, those are very tall mountains.

“Nearly,” Pharah answers. “I can see the bowl where the Ecopoint is situated, and a scattering of buildings. It looks deserted from here, but we should stop about a kilometer out, so I can switch to my maneuvering pack, just in case.”

Brigitte snorts. “They call it the Airdancer mod,” she says through the comms, and Pharah clucks her tongue.

Mei thinks it sounds lovely, if a little unnecessarily poetic. Pharah, however, is not so amused. “See how quickly my rocket misfires the next time you are in danger, Brigitte.”

“You’ll just do some sky ballet and make it work,” she answers, and they share a chuckle. Mei wishes she had the ease of comraderie these two share, but they also have a lot of shared history despite their age difference, and that tends to create fast bonds.

They crest the hill at long last, and Brigitte slows for a moment, looking for the safest path down the bowl Pharah had described. In the center of it is a scattering of buildings, looking as abandoned as Winston and Pharah keep saying.

“Winston, do you read?” Mei asks.

“HQ here, this better not be a prank call.”

Mei grimaces. Everyone is being so casual. “We are approaching the Ecopoint now. Anything new from the satellites?”

Silence while Brigitte starts a slow, winding descent towards a rough-hewn track that used to be a road, long-since reclaimed by the desert. Still better than the jostling overland they’ve been doing so far.

Winston comes back, “There was some garbled radio chatter near your location. Might have been just a local station bouncing around, but it could be an encrypted channel, as well. Stay frosty and good luck, Rocket Pop. HQ, out.”

Winston has way too much fun with her time in Antarctica and her ice-based tech.

They slow to a stop as Pharah requested, about a kilometer out, and Pharah lands to swap out her long-range jets for the Airdancer mod. The tank appears to be smaller to allow for greater range of motion for the thrusters, and is what all the stories are based around for their aerial battles. Rockets and guns whizzing around while they flit about like butterflies. The constant shifting of G force must be hard on their bodies, but Pharah seems more than hale and healthy.

“I will go back up and scout ahead,” Pharah says, lowering her visor on her helmet. “Wish me luck, eh, little  _ ukht _ ?” She pats Brigitte on the top of her head, and Brigitte swats at her as Pharah takes to the sky once more.

“Let’s get down there and see what there is to see,” Mei says, jealous of their familiarity.

The rover rolls back into motion and within a minute they come to another stop at the exterior fencing. The gate from the rough road they were on is left wide open, but there are no tracks or signs of people about. Everything has the dusty air of disuse about it.

This Ecopoint is designed differently, being a hot, dry climate, but there are design similarities to her Ecopoint in Antarctica everywhere she looks. Being back at an Ecopoint hurts her heart as she remembers her friends and colleagues she had to leave behind. She needs to go back and give them a proper burial. Once there’s time.

Mei hops down from the rover and raps twice on Snowball attached to her battery pack. He  _ whirrs _ to life and spins out in front of the group, digital eyebrows suggesting an exaggerated sleepy face. 

“I’m going to change your name to Goofball,” she threatens, and Snowball spins happily, making little chirps and beeps. “See if you can find an interface, okay? There should be a cradle like you had in Antarctica somewhere around here.”

Snowball pips cheerily and floats off, almost like a bird flitting between trees.

“Anything, Pharah?” Mei asks in the comms, while Brigitte helps Reinhardt extract himself from the rover. A torsion of twisting metal follows as Reinhardt’s bottom crushes the door frame of the back of the rover when he pulls too hard to get himself out. 

“These take time to fix, you big lunk,” Brigitte says, shoving him aside to try and work the metal back into place.

Pharah signals on the comms. “Nothing so far. You appear to be safe to approach the main building. I’m circling around the facility right now.”

“Thanks, Pharah. Ok, Reinhardt, lead the way. Shields at the ready, no idea what we’re walking into.”

Reinhardt lifts his giant hammer and lets it  _ clang _ against his shoulder armor. “I will destroy anything that stands in our way!” he declares, and before Mei can caution him, his thrusters activate and he charges away in a scream of fiery fury. Mei rubs her face where the heat blast pressed against her. She still has eyebrows, it seems.

Snowball lazily moves in front of Reinhardt’s path, and notices the giant bearing down on him just a moment before he’d be crushed by the forward momentum, and zips up and over the towering German as his charge ends halfway to the large bay doors, sealed shut.

Brigitte chuckles as she steps up next to Mei, shouldering her flail in much the same way Reinhardt had done his hammer. “You’ll get the hang of him. He always does what’s right, in the end.”

“It’s the moments before the end that I worry about,” Mei says, pulling her endothermic blaster and priming it for use. It’s hot enough that she’s not entirely sure how effective the freeze spray will be; the sweat forms and evaporates before she needs to wipe it away, and she pulls her cantina to take another drink of water.

“Not used to the heat?” Brigitte asks as they walk together toward Reinhardt, who is preparing another charge at the bay doors. She shakes her head, unable to answer and reprimand Reinhardt at the same time.

Mei says in the comms, “Don’t destroy the doors, if you can help it, Reinhardt. We may be able to use this facility, but not if the sandstorms can get in.”

He harumphs and then says, “Little Brigitte can fix whatever I break.”

Brigitte nudges Mei. “Treat him like a soldier,” she whispers. 

“Th-that is an order, Reinhardt.”

He harumphs again, but his posture slackens.

Suddenly Pharah shouts in the comms, “I’ve got tracks and a vehicle on the other side of the facility. We are not alone. Repeat, we are not--”

A shot spangs off Reinhardt’s helmet, sending him reeling backwards into some scaffolding next to a small utility shed. The scaffolding collapses and folds around Reinhardt in a rending twist of metal while Brigitte’s shield pops up in front of Mei. The two of them dash for cover and get behind a small electric pole that hopefully shields them just enough.

Mei’s heart thumps in her chest. It wasn’t supposed to be a combat mission!

“Winston, do you read?” she shouts into her comms, but only static answers her. “If you can hear this, we are under attack.”

“Reinhardt!” Brigitte shouts. Their comms have been completely cut off in the moment the shot was fired. “Talk to me, you big doofus!”

“No sniper can penetrate this thick skull!” he shouts back, ripping his way free of the tangle of scaffolding. As he gets to his feet, another shot fires just as his energy barrier erupts into place, crackling against the shot.

“Now I know where you are, coward,” Reinhardt yells, and starts moving forward to close the distance.

“We need to regroup,” Mei says, surprised at her own calm. “Reinhardt! Do not advance, come back to us.”

He doesn’t take heed this time, and continues walking forward, energy field in place. No more shots are fired at first, and then Pharah comes rocketing above the facility. The moment she appears, looking for her squadmates, a shot fires off and sparks fly from her jetpack. One of the thrusters fizzle, and the other sends her spiraling downwards into the main building of this Ecopoint. 

She crashes into glass, maybe a skylight? Silence follows the faint sound of tinkling glass.

_____

 

Footnote*: Atacama is a real desert, but a made up Ecopoint in terms of Overwatch. It exists along the coast and inland of Chile, and is one of the driest places on Earth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check back in a couple weeks to continue the adventure!


	3. You Look Like You've Seen a Ghost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mei makes a desperate dash to get inside the Ecopoint facility, under threat of sniper fire. She hopes to find Pharah, who was shot down by the sniper.
> 
> Once inside, Mei and Brigitte face a new foe of shadow and vengeance.

Pharah can’t be dead. She simply can’t be. Mei clutches Brigitte’s shoulder and overcharges her blaster with a quick adjustment. “We are getting inside that building. Follow me!”

She sees where Reinhardt is walking his slow way forward, out in the open. Too far for them to make use of his giant energy barrier. But she knows another trick from her time fixing the tower in Antarctica, and she runs out into the open. 

“But you’ll be shot!” Brigitte yells, chasing after Mei.

Let this work, she thinks. She aims the overloaded blaster and pulls the trigger, and a small wave of ice erupts out of the ground where she aimed. Just sand and heat one moment, then a flurry of ice crystals rocket up, forming a rough barrier between her and the sniper.

Not a moment too soon, as the unstable wall of ice cracks and starts to splinter from several sniper shots directed into it. For a moment she hears the booming crack of glacier ice separating before it all tumbles to the ground, already melting into the sand in this heat.

But they tumble behind Reinhardt’s shield, safe, for the moment.

“We must get inside!” Mei yells. “Back us up to the door so I can open it.”

Reinhardt grunts, not wishing to retreat, but Mei glances at Brigitte. “We don’t have time for this, Pharah is in trouble. Now, soldier!”

Reinhardt obeys. Up close the damage to his helmet is pretty severe, caved in on one side, but there’s no blood and he seems to be his usual cantankerous, boisterous self.

The large bay doors they back up into have a control panel, and Snowball appears beside Mei. “Can you access the network from here?” she asks her little floating friend.

He whirrs with determination and his digital readout shows concentrating brows, followed by a lightning bolt with a circle and a line through it, indicating no power. Mei touches the panel and it lights up, but she is no hacker. There is at least some power, though.

“No power, Snowball, or just not enough?”

Shots spang off Reinhardt’s barrier, and it continues to crack and fracture. He says, “Whatever you are planning, best hurry, because my barrier is failing!”

“Snowball,” Mei says, “Try again. You don’t have to open it all the way, just enough. You can do it!”

Snowball concentrates once more, and the keypad flickers before the large bay door hisses and begins to open, only to stop after just a meter or so.

“Maybe we can force it open more,” Brigitte says as they back up to the small opening. Mei slides inside, snowball hovering around her, her jacket almost getting caught. It is dark and silent inside, but she has no time to be intimidated just yet. Brigitte and Mei use all their force to try and pull on the door, but without the power to make it move smoothly, it is just locked in place.

Brigitte looks like she has an idea as she peers inside, but then she is shoved through harshly by a big metal gauntlet.

Brigitte yells, catching her balance with Mei’s help. “You big oaf, what--”

“No time! I’ll take care of this coward. You find Fareeha; I am not about to let Ana haunt me for letting her daughter come to harm.”

Before Mei can argue, the big tin can’s barrier breaks. Reinhardt was waiting for this, it seems, as he immediately activates his hammer’s projectile, swinging it in a high arc so that the energy rushes out directly at the sniper nest.

His thrusters roar to life as he charges after the fire strike, yelling and laughing.

“The man is out of his mind,” Mei says, and Brigitte shrugs. 

She says, “He’s never one to back down from a fight, especially if he thinks it’ll keep someone safe.”

Mei pats Snowball’s dome, and the little robot hums happily with a job well done. “Then we had better hurry so we can get back out and help him.”

Snowball activates his lantern mode and hovers above the pair as they creep in through the building. Brigitte activates a high power spotlight beam on her gauntlet. Through the open bay door Reinhardt is tearing apart the outdoors, but in here it is funereal. 

There are similarities here, too. The living and working space of an Ecopoint is customized to the environment around it, but mostly that manifests in the materials used and the ventilation systems. A sudden jolt of memory hits her: waking into the darkness after her cryostasis, fumbling around for caffeine, no idea yet that her entire world had changed and she was all alone.

This place is too similar. Brigitte nudges her shoulder. “You okay? We need to keep moving.”

“Sorry! Sorry sorry sorry,” she says, trailing off into a mumble. She should be more assertive, but she’s feeling rather helpless at the moment.

“Snowball, pull up the schematic of the building. Where is a skylight from here?” 

Snowball weaves around and above a maze of crates, his digital readout showing an arrow the direction he wants them to go.

It looks like there are all kinds of supplies left over, and Mei hopes they can deal with this combat situation quickly after finding Pharah, so they can begin inventory.

They pass through the command center, everything dim and in standby or completely shut down. Further on they find the botany lab, dark and empty. And beyond that, a large atrium or recreation center. There are benches, wide open spaces, tables, crates, all scattered about. A couple catwalks range above the area, connecting other parts of the Ecopoint, with metal beams between the catwalks. And in the middle of it all, with light beaming in from a skylight, some of it shattered and scattered on the ground, around a dazed but alive Pharah.

Brigitte rushes in to her friend and Mei steps in slowly, wary of the space. If there are more intruders besides the sniper, she doesn’t want to be caught off guard. But she is pleased to see Pharah get to her feet with Brigitte’s help, and Brigitte attaches one of her armor packs to Pharah’s armor, which immediately begins to mesh back together where it was scratched and damaged.

“Someday you will have to explain how that works,” Pharah says. “Looks like I won’t be flying any time soon.” She lifts her visor and looks around. “Reinhardt?”

Mei says, “Dealing with the sniper who shot you down. We should get back out and help him now that you’re okay.”

“Okay is a relative term,” Pharah says. “I’ll have bruises in places I’d rather not discuss by the time the day is done.”

Brigitte claps Pharah on the back. “Bruises just mean you’re alive enough to heal.”

“I can remedy that,” a sinister, almost echoing, voice says. It seems to come from everywhere and nowhere, bouncing off the walls and settling into Mei’s gut like Heibai Wuchang*  finally come to claim her.

The Talon operative known as Reaper appears from the darkness, laughing in a cloak of blackest shadow wreathed around his skull facemask. He forms from the shadows, pointing two shotguns at her and Brigitte. Four mercenaries are to his right, thug operatives that Mei saw dossiers on: a trooper with an assault rifle, an enforcer with heavier armor and a charge shotgun, an assassin with blades, and a heavy assault with miniguns. 

Reaper chuckles, which elicits crazed laughter from his assassin thug. “Overwatch brats trying to revive a corpse.”

Mei steps forward, scared out of her mind. “We don’t want any trouble. Step aside, and we will leave peacefully.”

Reaper scoffs, his shotguns bobbing menacingly. “Nothing peaceful about you.”

“Don’t push us, creep,” Brigitte says.

Pharah leans in next to Mei. “Separate them,” she whispers. “I can handle him if you get his lackeys.”

“You’re outnumbered and outgunned,” Reaper continues, seeming not to have heard her. Mei nods.

Her endothermic blaster is primed, and she holds it up as if she is giving up, lowering it until the angle is juuuuust right…

She fires, and the ice shards fly up between Reaper and his thugs. Well, almost between. The trooper is launched skyward by the sudden force of the ice, slamming against a metal beam overhead before collapsing to the ground, where it shudders and spasms in a shower of sparks until it stops moving.

Chaos ensues as Reaper shifts to shadow, coming at the trio. The assassin blinks in and out of view, moving so fast her eye can’t track it. The enforcer’s shotgun begins to charge, aiming directly at her midsection. The heavy assault leans back, thrusters firing.

Pharah’s one good thruster throws her off to the side as a rocket shoots through Reaper’s shadowy form, erupting against the top of the wall of ice, sending shards of jagged ice in every direction and knocking the Enforcer off-balance. His shotgun charge goes off, but wide and blasts a hole in the metal wall behind Mei.

Brigitte throws up her shield barrier as the heavy assault charges. Mei reverts her blaster and narrows the aperture, aiming for the enforcer while his shotgun recharges. 

Rockets explode and shotgun blasts echo on the other side of the room, where Pharah and Reaper whirl around each other. She jets to one side to avoid a face full of shotgun, but he shifts into shadow as her rockets sail through and blow holes in the wall, the floor. 

Brigitte holds her position, bracing for impact while Mei looks at the enforcer. She fires, but the ice shard glances off his helmet harmlessly and she throws herself behind a nearby bench to avoid the worst of the shotgun blast.

Metal rends and contorts from the force, but she is okay. Brigitte tries to bash the heavy assault with her barrier, but he is coming too fast with too much weight, and she flies through the air, colliding with the wall before dropping to the ground, coughing.

And the assassin is on Brigitte while Mei is recovering, trying to figure out what to do. The assassin laughs wickedly as the blades carve into Brigitte’s gauntlets and chestpiece. Mei aims and fires at the distracted assassin, but she is moving too erratically to get more than annoyed at the shard piercing into one arm.

The heavy assault turns on Mei, his mini guns whirring into motion while the enforcer’s shotgun charges back up. Mei turns the dial on her blaster back to normal and, in a moment of panic, does what any green soldier would. 

She leaps out into the fray, her blaster in full “spray and pray” mode. The enforcer instantly stops as ice forms around his body, slowing his movements. The heavy assault’s mini guns jam up from ice and she takes this moment to throw herself at the assassin while they are distracted.

Her body collides with the assassin, throwing her off Brigitte and sending both of them tumbling together as Mei can’t correct fast enough not to go rolling with the enemy.

A rocket blasts the enforcer back and into a wall, crushing his chestpiece and shorting him out. Pharah salutes as she turns back to take the full brunt of a shotgun blast in her chestplate. The armor pack knits it back up as best it can, but Pharah spits a little blood as the shotgun blast knocks her back into the heavy assault. 

Something sparks in his back and the heavy assault flails wildly. Brigitte gets back to her feet while Mei is tumbling with the assassin, but the heavy assault seems to be recovering from the ice and the damage to his back. His guns start ramping up to fire at Brigitte and Mei, and Brigitte throws herself in front of the struggling Mei, shield up, as the mini guns start firing away.

Her barrier will be gone in seconds from that, but Brigitte doesn’t wait. She stalks forward and activates her flail, launching it like a rocket punch at the heavy assault. The mini guns bend and misfire as the flail hits him with enough force to throw him back into the remainder of the ice wall, which shatters and collapses on top of him, sending sparks flying in every direction from the weight of the ice.

The assassin has recovered, though, and climbs on top of Mei, wildly slashing. Mei has no armor and all she can do is try to avoid the blades under this wild omnic assassin.

Shadows dart across the skylight, and Snowball comes flying in like a battering ram, catching the assassin off-guard long enough for Brigitte to smash her across the back with her flail. Bursts of nanotech erupt out of the flail, raining down on Mei, clotting the cuts along her arms and one on her chest, feeding her adrenaline.

Mei aims her blaster up, intending to slow the assassin down, but she leaps away and disappears, moving fast enough that they lose sight of her momentarily.

Pharah isn’t handling Reaper too well, and he is laughing maniacally at her attempts to end him with explosives.

“Help her,” Mei says, “I have an idea.”

She watches as Brigitte nods, turns, and charges into the fray against Reaper. Surely the two of them can handle one guy?

She turns back to the assassin, darting here and there in the room, closing the distance and then scampering away every time Mei’s blaster shoots a shower of cryo fluid. She’s too fast for Mei to hit this way. So she changes tactics.

The dial on the blaster is adjusted, and she takes aim. Left, right, left, middle, left, right, left, middle. The assassin darts around, and Mei tracks not where she sees the murderous bot, but where she knows it’ll be next.

Left, right, left, middle, left, right, left, middle. She aims to the left a meter closer than the assassin was a moment ago, and fires. The split-second time difference between the blaster firing its ice shard, and the assassin’s rapid movement, is perfect. The shard slices through the assassin’s head, a torsion of metal and silicon, as the assassin slumps to the ground, lifeless. She feels bad momentarily, hoping it wasn’t an Omnic.

She turns her attention to Reaper, who dodges away from Brigitte’s flail, such that his shadowy form lifts up and onto a crate above Pharah. He jumps off, shotguns aiming directly down on Pharah’s head, and her single thruster activates, rocketing awkwardly into him just before he pulls the triggers. They collide in mid-air and Pharah’s wrist-rocket sends a concussive shockwave between them, tossing Pharah back to her squad and Reaper into a corner of the room, gasping and clutching his chest where Pharah barreled into him.

With all of the Talon thugs dealt with, Mei, Brigitte, and Pharah regroup and converge on Reaper. Mei doesn’t know a ton about Talon at this point, only what she’s read in the dossiers, but she’s heard about Reaper from Winston, and he’s so dangerous that Watchpoint: Gibraltar was no longer safe as a base of operations after his attack.

“We’ve got him,” Brigitte says, and Mei certainly hopes so.

“You’ve got nothing,” Reaper says in his horrible echoing voice. They surround him, waiting for him to make a move. Brigitte’s shield is up, Pharah’s visor is down, and Mei feels unprepared in just her sliced-up Overwatch jacket.

He fakes an attack against Mei, and she acts on instinct, spraying her blaster on him, but he turns to shadow and laughs, spinning in a tight circle.

Pharah yells, “Get cover!” but Mei doesn’t act fast enough. Reaper’s shadowy form is half in, half out, and his shotguns start firing indiscriminately, but with so much coverage, so fast, that everything within a meter of him is getting blasted.

Brigitte throws herself between Mei and Reaper, her barrier taking the brunt of the blasts, and Pharah’s thruster activates, but not before the shotgun pellets are doing their damage.

Just as Brigitte’s shield looks ready to shatter, something shoots from above, unbalancing Reaper and bringing him out of his attack. He swirls out of shadow, holding his arm where a dart sticks out. He looks wavery and unstable.

Brigitte helps pull Mei and Pharah to safety away from Reaper as they all look around.

Standing on one of the catwalks, rifles at the ready, are two people: a woman wearing a cat mask, and an older man with gray hair and camo greasepaint, wearing a large visor over his eyes.

Mei has seen news stories about these two. Bastet and Soldier: 76. Vigilantes on the hunt for Talon. What’s more, Pharah gasps as she sees the pair.

“Mother?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heibai Wuchang is a Chinese pair of figures representing light and darkness, often responsible for bringing the spirits of the dead to the Chinese folkloric understanding of the Underworld. A reaper-like death figure in Chinese folklore.


	4. Are You Afraid to Fight Me?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mei and the team retreat to recover from their wounds sustained by Reaper, while the vigilantes Bastet and Soldier: 76 face off with Reaper. Reinhardt plays a game of cat and mouse with Widowmaker. The Talon agents coordinate a surprise attack.

There’s a moment of tense silence as everyone in the room takes in these newcomers. Pharah stares up at Bastet, and Reaper coughs, grunting.

He says, “You’re beginning to get on my nerves, Jack.”

Soldier: 76--Jack Morrison?--grunts in response. Bastet--Ana Amari?--nods at Pharah and the other two women who threw themselves to safety. 

“You should retreat,” Bastet says in unmistakeable Egyptian accent. “We can handle this one.”

Pharah starts to say, “But Mother--” before Soldier’s rockets fire at the place Reaper is standing. It’s a concentrated blast, hardly a shockwave a couple meters out, but Reaper’s form turns to shadow in the midst of it and he laughs. 

“Let’s finish this, then,” he says, swirling up to the catwalk to face off with this unexpected duo.

Mei grabs Pharah and Brigitte covers their retreat as the clang of metal and clash of rifle to shotgun explodes in their ears. Above, Bastet and Soldier stand back-to-back, protecting against Reaper and shooting when they can. They are a sight to behold, working in unison, a team born of years.

Mei loses track of them as the three women dart around a corner, leaving the big atrium space for the moment. Rifles, shotguns, laughter, and yelling chase them out the door.

Pharah appears to be thunderstruck, and it takes an effort on both Mei and Brigitte’s part to keep the woman standing still rather than rushing back into the fray.

Pharah says, “I knew she was alive, but I had gotten used to the idea we still wouldn’t see each other.”

“You’re sure it’s her?” Brigitte asks, applying the last of her healing nanotech to the wounds they all sustained against Reaper’s massive attack. Mei is glad Snowball wasn’t nearby, and she realizes she isn’t sure where he’s gotten off to.

She hopes he’s okay.

“I would know my mother’s voice anywhere,” Pharah says. “We should go back in and help. There’s five of us now!”

Brigitte pushes back against her. “Once the nanos do their thing, we can all go in and have tea. Let the elders fight it out for a minute.”

“If it was Reinhardt in there, you wouldn’t hesitate!” Pharah argues. “Or your father!”

“The only reason that idiot is alive is because I DO hesitate.”

That brings Pharah up short. Mei doesn’t know all the history behind the close-knit Overwatch family, and she has never felt more like an outsider than at this moment.

“Reinhardt, can you hear us?” Mei asks over the comms. She doesn’t expect it to work, and it doesn’t, but it was worth trying. “We also do not know what has happened to him outside. If Reaper is here, then the sniper outside is surely Widowmaker, right?”

“The only sniper with more kills is my mother, if so,” Pharah says. She has settled for a moment, and Mei listens to the raucous combat in the next room. Some kind of nanotech grenade, more rifle fire. How does one kill a shadow?

Mei says, “We will go back in the moment Brigitte gives us the all clear.”

“All clear,” Brigitte says, “but if you get hurt, retreat. I can’t do anything more if you get a bullet in the chest, not until my nanos recharge.”

Pharah stands tall and nods. “We will see who retreats when I get back in there.”

Mei charges her blaster from her backpack and confirms the dial is set to icicle still. She tries not to think about the trooper and the assassin thugs. They were bots, but were they “alive”? She hopes not.

She screws up her courage and whispers “Where are you, Snowball?” before saying out loud, “Let’s go save the old folks.”

*****

The big dumb oaf yells, “Stop swinging around like an acrobat and FIGHT ME!” but  Amélie uses a grappling hook to pull herself to safety every time he gets near her perch or nest. It will take some time, but she is prepared to whittle his armor down until he either tires and dies, or she gets off the final headshot.

“Are the brats dealt with, Reaper?” she asks over the comms.

He answers, “There’s a couple old gnats bothering me, too. Working on it.”

This was supposed to be a quick mission to suppress the reforming Overwatch, to gather some intel and supplies from an old Ecopoint. It’s turning into more trouble than it is worth.

Widowmaker’s lips turn up to form a sly grin and she deftly fires her venom mine while launching through the air to her next perch, a radio tower that doesn’t offer up much protection. The perfect bait for the likes of Wilhelm Reinhardt.

And sure enough, she gets one shot off before his thrusters propel him towards the base of the radio tower, hammer at the ready. She waits until the armored figure is just about to crush the frame of the tower and leaps off, grappling to another small building as the radio tower crumples and her venom mine bursts. 

She is rewarded with Reinhardt’s coughing fit, and gets a few shots on the back of his armor plating, denting it inward, before he recovers and pulls his shield barrier up between them.

“You fight dirty,” Reinhardt shouts. “Where is your honor, coward!”

Honor? she thinks. No such thing as honor in a world where Gérard is gone, due to the organization who helped make her into the abomination she is today.

She smirks, seeing another opportunity to bait Reinhardt and maybe put the final bullet in his brain.

She waves him on, ready to grapple to a water tower. He yells something unintelligible in German and she calls him a fool, hooking the water tower and launching away as he approaches. She lands safely on top of the tower, only to turn back to see his Fire Strike the moment before it impacts the tower under her.

Long since emptied, the reservoir shrieks and rends metal, crumbling beneath her so that she loses her balance.

As she falls, Reaper says over the comms, “It’s time.”

She grins again as she is falling. The impact with the ground won’t kill her, but Reinhardt is about to receive a very rude awakening.

She presses the button as she falls and rolls, and Reinhardt runs up while she is on the ground in a puff of dust, coughing.

“I will give you one chance to sur--” and the world goes red and then white.

*****

Mei, Brigitte, and Pharah charge back in, metal clanking to match the fever pitch of the rifle fire and explosions. How many bullets and bombs do they all have?

But Reaper sees them all and counts his odds. “It’s time,” Mei hears him say, and a second or two later a bunch of beeps from all over the room begin sounding off.

“Sonofa- Take cover!” Soldier yells as Bastet shoots her sidearm at Reaper while he’s distracted. 

Everything happens in a kind of slow motion.

Pharah tries to rocket up to her mother, still on the catwalk, and her thruster misfires, sending her reeling off towards Soldier. At the same moment Pharah shot herself up, Bastet launches over the railing, presumably to come after Pharah, and they miss each other by inches in the air.

Pharah collides with Soldier, sending them toppling over onto the wavering consciousness of Reaper down below.

Snowball appears across the room as Mei shouts for Pharah, and Brigitte looks around for cover. Bastet hits the concrete and rolls into motion, looking for Pharah but coming up next to Mei and Brigitte.

The first explosion rocks the foundation of the building, and Brigitte’s energy barrier forms into place only to be shattered instantaneously by the blast, throwing her backwards into Mei and Bastet.

They tumble back through the corridor together as more explosions rip through the building. All is sound, all is cacophony and terror. 

Mei, Brigitte, and Bastet topple over each other as the crates on the other side of the wall explode. The metal wall shields them from the blast, but the doorway is a torsion of metal and slag.

The ceiling collapses all around them. Mei does the only thing she can think to do: overcharges her blaster and creates a new ice wall on either side of them, blocking them into a 10 meter space. More explosions rock all around them, and Bastet beats into the ice wall to no effect.

Brigitte holds her arm where it was burned from the flashpoint explosion that shredded her energy barrier.

The ceiling buckles above them, but the ice walls provide a foundation. It stabilizes as the ground stops shaking and the explosions cease. 

Silence. Punctuated by the constant chunk, chunk, chunk of Bastet’s sniper rifle butt against the ice.

They are alive. Somehow they didn’t get caught directly in an explosion.

Bastet tears her mask off, and despite the wrinkles and the white hair, it is clearly Pharah’s mother. They even have the same eye tattoo. Horus. The legendary Ana of Overwatch and the Egyptian military.

Other sounds intrude. Faint explosions, tumbling pieces of a ruin that forgot its shape. Brigitte is seething and holding back tears from her burns.

Pharah. Soldier: 76. Reinhardt. Snowball.

They may still be alive, but they may not. The only thing to do in this moment is damage control.

So Mei grabs Ana by the shoulder, yanking her back from the small chink in the ice she’s made.

“Brigitte is hurt, do you know how to help a burn?”

Ana glances down, eyes glazed with worry and then frustration as she focuses on what she can do right here, right now. “I can give her something for the pain, but can’t you use that cold gun?”

Mei grumbles. “I am a climatologist, not an MD.”

“Today we’re all whatever we need to be, Mei-Ling Zhou.”

That pulls Mei up short. “How did you--”

“I was a task force coordinator and communications specialist for years under Overwatch. I know the names and faces of every member of every team we ever deployed, even the science ones. Your frost ray can help.”

Ana injects Brigitte with something that immediately calms the girl down, her fists unclenching.

“My blaster?” Mei asks, not bothering to correct her in the moment.

“Create a cold compress using it and apply it to the girl’s burns. It won’t damage the tissue if it is applied indirectly, and should soothe the burns until we can get her patched up.

Brigitte says, “I can patch myself, as soon as my nanos recharge.”

“I don’t suppose you can bring this ice down?” Ana asks, turning back to the wall now that Brigitte is handled.

“It’s kind of there until it melts or breaks. Her flail might do it.”

“That thing might be what is keeping the ceiling from turning us all into my father,” Brigitte jokes, and they all share a quick laugh.

“You look nothing like Torbjörn, my dear.”

“More’s the pity,” she says, standing up. “What are we supposed to do now?

Mei sighs. “I do not think there is anything else to do except wait, unless we want to risk another collapse.”

“Then we wait,” Ana says, nodding She leans up against the normal metal wall next to the ice walls. Now that she has been distracted, she doesn’t go back to panicking about her daughter, or her friend.

Mei tries to communicate with her comms for a couple of minutes but receives static and silence in return. She thinks that means the jamming has stopped, but now there are too many things interfering with the signal.

After about five minutes, Brigitte shrugs and groans. “This is boring.”

Ana chuckles. “Try waiting for two days without sleep for a target to appear, so you get one shot before he’s gone forever.”

“That’s not a true story,” Brigitte says. “Father told me so.”

“Your father has the shape and tact of a teakettle. Little Lindholm, what tales has he spun out of steam and dream?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things will slow down as the trapped Overwatch agents kill time, in the next chapter a couple weeks from now!


	5. Shh, The Adults Are Talking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pharah keeps the peace between Soldier: 76 and Reaper. Mei and Brigitte listen to Ana's stories while they are trapped.

Jack Morrison pulls Pharah to her feet. She is dazed and coughing, unsure where she is and what has happened. She tried to get to her mother, but their instincts had been the same and they missed each other.

“Jack?” Pharah confirms, and Soldier nods.

“It’s good to see you, Fareeha. Wish the circumstances were better.”

Their circumstances are grim. The hole in the ceiling where she fell through has widened, since most of the rubble around them is part of the building. Her friends and her mother are nowhere to be seen, but Reaper is slumped against the wall, a shadowy form in his black hood. 

She asks, “Are they--”

“Unknown. After our tumble off the catwalk, there was nothing to do but hold out and wait for it to be over. But they’re tough.”

“So you don’t know.” Jack shrugs. 

“What I’m worried about right now is restraining Reyes before he wakes up. We were here to hunt him down.”

Pharah checks her thrusters, but they are damaged beyond her ability to repair right now. “If he can do that shadow thing, I fear no restraints will work. Did you say it was Reyes? As in Gabriel?”

Jack grunts. Pharah huffs. “Are any of the old team actually dead? You are all coming out of the woodwork lately.”

This causes a rueful laugh from Jack. “Figured you’d be happy about that.”

She is, but she’s also angry. “You all helped to raise me, Jack. You were Uncle Morris. I grieved for every one of you. I am a different person because you all died.”

Jack ties some basic rope restraints around Reaper--Gabriel--but doesn’t look satisfied.

“You have nothing to say?” Pharah presses.

“I don’t apologize where feelings are concerned. War doesn’t hold your hand when the bodies start to drop.”

Pharah’s heart aches to hear it. This man, whom she used to admire, is nothing but a vigilante, one step away from being a criminal. And her mother is with him.

Pharah shrugs and turns away, trying to find a way free of this mess. Everywhere she turns it is more rubble, more destruction. If they could climb up or fly up, it would be easy. But nothing’s ever easy.

“You’re a hypocrite,” Pharah says finally. Jack seems taken aback momentarily, but she has a hard time telling with the visor covering most of his face.

“Am I?” he asks. “I don’t think so.”

“You are playing at war and pretending none of it affects you, that you must do what must be done. But one of the world’s deadliest killers is on the floor in front of us. A man you claimed to be hunting down. A man who was once your best friend.”

“If you’re getting to a point?” he asks, rolling his shoulders in a way that she remembers from her younger days as a nervous tic.

“You are not a soldier, and you are not law enforcement. Based on the news of your exploits, killing comes easy. And yet you have a wanted killer, a man set to execute if he is ever caught, and you are trying to restrain him instead of pulling a bullet in his brain.”

“You don’t know anything about it,” Jack says, shoulders tensing. He turns away from her, from what she is saying. “Gabe will be brought to justice…”

“Justice is just your excuse,” Pharah says.

“Call it what you want. I will bring Reyes in alive if I can. The other options are just in case.”

“Well, does he have something on him that phases him out of reality or whatever it is? A device, or implant maybe? Something we can remove.”

Jack reaches down to Reaper, but the black-clad man turns to shadow as soon as Jack touches him. His shadowy form shifts away from Jack and Fareeha, and they go back to back, weapons raised. There is a moment of pure, nostalgic embarrassment at finally,  _ finally _ , teaming up with the legendary Jack Morrison, a dream of hers since she was a little girl playing with Overwatch figures and following the team about in their off-hours with starry-eyed ambition. Then the moment passes and they are just two soldiers facing off against a dangerous, unpredictable enemy.

But Reaper reforms along a shredded wall a distance away, a slow clap beginning as he leans against the wall.

“You almost got me, Jack.”

A tense moment passes, while Pharah waits for one or the other side to do something. 

Jack’s shoulders tense against Pharah’s back and she holds up a hand. “Wait. Both of you.”

He does, for a wonder. Reaper looks bored with it all.

“We can go back to killing each other, sure,” she says. “But we’re all trapped in here, and who knows if the others are alive? Right now, we may need each other to escape unharmed.”

Jack considers, and she can tell it is a hard-won thing to convince him, but he finally nods and slowly lowers his rifle. “I can truce if he can.”

Reaper mumbles something Pharah can’t hear and nods, too. “Just like the old days, huh, Jack?”

“If only,” Jack mutters. 

*****

Mei scribbles in her journal by flashlight, doodling Snowball out of worry for him. He was in the atrium when the charges went off, and his digital readout was blinking something. A hard drive icon? Had he found something useful? No way to know until they met up again.

Please be okay. 

“We might be here a while,” Brigitte says. Mei looks up to see Brigitte is tinkering on her shield barrier, attempting to get it working again after that explosion knocked it out of commission. She gets the same look of excited determination that Mei recognizes in herself when she’s working on a set of data or graphing climate changes.

“Patience is a virtue, little Lindholm,” Ana says, leaning against the metal wall with her rifle leaned against her shoulder. It is a comfortable look, born of years of waiting. Of bodies stacked as high as Lijiang Tower. A shiver runs down Mei’s spine that has nothing to do with the cold radiating from her ice walls.

Brigitte snorts. “I think we all know I’m not the little one in the family.”

Ana nods and Mei smiles. She never knew Torbjörn, but his short stature and grumpy demeanor are legendary. “What were they like?” Mei asks.

“Father and the rest? You knew some of them, right?” Brigitte asks, turning a screwdriver on a part of her shield, disassembling it.

Mei shakes her head. “Not really. I had met Jack Morrison and Dr. Ziegler, but Jack only in passing, and Dr. Ziegler was a head of medicine and science, so she had some oversight on the Ecopoint projects. Jack was all business, and Dr. Ziegler was always more concerned with medicine and ethical care to really get what a team of scientists were doing in Antarctica, or Atacama, or anywhere else.”

Ana shrugs. “This place was researching long-term effects of graduated heating before it decommissioned, right?”

Mei nods. “Towards the end of Overwatch, most of the Ecopoints had shifted focus to the rapid climate change. Despite our best efforts in the 2020s and 2030s to slow and stabilize the climatological disaster the previous century had caused, something new was going on. The data I brought back from Antarctica is one piece, and so is the information Ecopoint Marsyangdi near the Himalayas was kind enough to grant me.”

“Marsyangdi is operational?” Ana asks.

Mei nods. “Not under any official designation, but they are scientists, and they believe in what they are doing. Funding is another matter. Nepal doesn’t have the deep pockets, so they rely on donations from sympathetic governments in the United Nations. Ecopoint Marsyangdi is what I was hoping against hope this place was, instead of abandoned.”

Brigitte asks, “Well, this mission became combat-oriented quick enough. It’s a good thing you know how to fight, on top of being this badass scientist.”

Mei blushes. “I was lucky. If anything, it is you and Fareeha who kept me from making too many mistakes.”

Ana smiles. “You’re green, Mei, but you did well. Being alive is the preferred outcome. The rest is just icing.”

Mei doesn’t know how to take this compliment, so she shifts the conversation. “So is the story about Jesse McCree being the inspiration for ‘Six-Gun Killer’ true?”

Ana laughs. “I haven’t seen the movie. But probably. Every story you hear about Jesse is true, at least a little bit. He is not a liar, but he loves to embellish.”

Brigitte interrupts, “What about my father? You suggested his stories aren’t exactly truth.”

Ana shrugs. “Reinhardt and Torbjörn tend to forget the details. Where you know the tales of honor, and glory, and invention, is actually a trail of bodies and mistakes.”

Mei’s face must mirror Brigitte’s, which is shocked and upset, but Ana holds up a hand. “I mean only that they tell the parts that make them seem most heroic. We none of us like to recount the soldiers-in-arms dead, the battles lost, the long nights before yet another funeral for yet another friend.”

“You make it sound so tragic,” Mei says, pulling her knees to her chest and wrapping her arms around them.

“War is always tragic, and Overwatch is always at war. Even now, you went on a peaceful mission to gather data and a building exploded. With us inside.”

Brigitte scoffs. “So the story about waiting two days for a target, what’s the part you don’t like to tell?”

Ana tenses. “I’m not sure this is a game you want to play, Brigitte.”

Mei agrees, but stays silent.

Brigitte sighs and finishes tinkering. The energy barrier comes back, flickers a bit, and then stabilizes. “Good enough for now. I’d like to know what my father was too afraid to tell me, that he said you never did it in the first place.”

Ana considers them both, and then leans forward. “I took out the target, that part is true. I waited nearly two full days, forty four hours, for the opportunity. I watched dozens of crimes being committed in the meantime. Thefts, abuse, trafficking of people and drugs, Omnic black market upgrades. And all of those happened. I had to let it all happen in order to get the shot.”

“You took out the leader, though, right?” Mei asks. “The criminal organization was done.”

Ana shakes her head. “It was a government, corrupt to the core. I took out one leader, and another, even worse, took his place. The crimes continued after a short hiatus. The only thing I accomplished was one more notch on my rifle. One more sin.”

They sit silently, and Mei does not know how to move on from such a confession. 

Brigitte barrels forward, though. “And my father? My  _ gudfader _ ? What stories don’t they like to tell.”

Ana smiles and chuckles. “There is one I like to tell about them and they hate it.”

Mei senses a humorous story and leans forward, eager to be done with these dour feelings. Brigitte nods. “Go on, then.”

“There was a mission in Venezuela, to protect key government officials during what was an expected coup attempt. Reinhardt, Torbjörn, Jack, myself, and a few others each formed strike streams and were assigned individuals within the government to protect.”

“I don’t remember any Venezuelan coup attempts from Overwatch’s history,” Brigitte says.

“You wouldn’t,” Ana says, grinning. “It was quietly quelled with intelligence reports and those involved were arrested without any fanfare.”

“And why don’t they like you to tell this story?” Mei asks.

Ana chuckles again. “Reinhardt and Torbjörn were assigned the same family, and they had set up at the family’s home, keeping watch. Your father, Brigitte, was patrolling the back gardens when he heard noises he would swear to this day were ‘sneaking insurgents’. He called Reinhardt and the strike team, coded emergency in the back garden, and Reinhardt--”

“Oh my God, he didn’t,” Brigitte says.

“Your godfather yelled something about protecting the innocent and maintaining the glory of the Crusaders, and rocketed through the house, barreling down walls and doors in his haste to get outside. He nearly knocked Torbjörn down, who leapt out of the way into a compost bin.”

They all share a good laugh, Brigitte loudest of all, and she says, “And what was it, then? The ‘sneaking insurgents’.”

“That is the best part. It was a family of skunks, so frightened by the sudden commotion that they--well, you can imagine.”

They devolve into a fit of giggles and soft chuckles. Finally, Brigitte calms herself enough to say, “Reinhardt does say his Crusader armor smells funny on hot days.”

Mei’s nose wrinkles at that. It is good to laugh and keep their spirits up, not knowing the fates of their comrades. 

She pulls the Pachimummy patch from her pocket, feelings its tight threads. Pharah probably isn’t sitting around telling war stories. She is getting things done. Making plans, executing plans. Any other fate for her new friend is unacceptable.

If only they could devise their own rescue… she looks around at their confines now. Surely they can find their own way out of an exploded building.

A soldier, a scientist, and an engineer walk into a bar, and the world trembles at what they can accomplish. A soldier delivers the punchline. She giggles and stands, renewed vigor and a plan shaping up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mei and Brigitte listening to Ana's war stories was the initial conception for the entire mission, so I hope you enjoyed this chapter!


	6. No Shortcuts, Just Hard Work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pharah works with Reaper and Soldier: 76 to free themselves from the exploded building. Mei and Ana support Brigitte's bid for freedom.

Widowmaker alights on a seemingly safe portion of the main building. It was dicey for a moment when he surprised her with that energy strike where she was landing, but the explosions gave her time to regroup and escape.

Though the building has been destroyed in large part, there are still functioning foundations and walls holding up her end, giving her a place to communicate. But before she does, she hears Reinhardt on the ground, yelling wordlessly at the building where his team just likely died.

He is ignoring her for the moment, and she could take an easy shot or two on him, but the mission comes first.

“Reaper, did an explosion finally kill you?” she asks in her comms.

A few moments pass and she thinks, maybe he isn’t immortal after all, and then he mumbles into the comms, “Still alive.”

She keeps an eye on Reinhardt, who is running around the base of the building, looking for an ingress he isn’t likely to find. “And Overwatch?”

“Just like the old days, huh, Jack?” Reaper says, indicating there are still others alive.

“Extraction may be difficult,” she says, watching Reinhardt pull on a large concrete wall. He almost lifts it before getting angry and smashing it into smaller, more manageable pieces.

“I have more explosives,” Reaper says. Interesting. Is he working with Morrison?

“Understood,” she says, aiming down the sights on Reinhardt again. It would be so easy to take advantage of an old man’s panic. So easy.

So why is she hesitating?

She runs along the top of the wall until she finds another structure to grapple onto, and lands on a smaller building, undisturbed by the explosions and dust settling.

It isn’t Reinhardt’s fault, what happened to Gérard, what happened to her. 

Talon won’t be pleased, but she can spin this. A spider spins more than web.

*****

Jack and Pharah are investigating an exterior wall while keeping one eye on Reaper. Reyes. She knew Reyes when she was little; he was always around when Uncle Morris was. That they’re both still alive is miraculous, that they’re both angry and want each other dead is a cruel fate.

Suddenly some rubble shifts, and Pharah aims her now-empty launcher along with Reyes and Jack. Expecting one of their friends, or maybe one of the Talon bots recharging.

And a brief burble of digital noise erupts just as the tiny blue Ecopoint assistant breaks free. Snowball shakes dust off, and its digital readout shows two panicked eyes before switching to angry brows and charging at Reaper.

“Whoa, there, little friend,” Pharah says, scooping it easily from the air. “We have something of a truce. Isn’t that right, Gabriel?”

Reaper shrugs, and points to the wall that Jack and Pharah were investigating a moment ago. “I have more explosives.”

“Because killing us worked so well the first time,” Jack says.

Snowball settles in Pharah’s hands and contents to hover around her once she eases her grip. It has dings and scratches, but nothing a buff and a jewel hammer won’t fix.

Its digital readout shows a pair of glasses and the hairpin that Mei likes to wear, with a question mark after them.

“I’m sure she’s fine, Snowball,” Pharah says, rubbing the top of its dome like she is petting a cat. It droops a little, readout turning black. “We will find her. In the meantime, can you run calculations and figure out where it would be best to set explosives if we want to break an exterior wall and leave? Preferably without collapsing anything else.”

Snowball’s body pivots up and down like a nodding head, and it flits off, examining and scanning the walls, giving Reaper a wide breadth.

While it and Reaper are distracted, Pharah calls over Jack. He shoulders his rifle and grunts when he gets near.

“Are you hurt?” Pharah asks.

“Just old. Are we really going to trust him?” he whispers.

She eyes him askance. “We are the good guys here, Jack. We made an agreement, and I intend to honor it, at least until we are safely outside again.”

“All bets are off, outside,” he agrees.

“That’s not what I--”

“I know what you meant, and I know what I said. Reyes will be arrested today.”

He stalks off, ignoring her sigh of frustration. “May I never be as stubborn as old men fighting a dead war,” she mutters.

Together, under the--hopefully accurate--guidance of Snowball, the trio of distrust places explosives and cobbled-together detonator wire. Jack gives up his last Helix rockets, and Reaper sniggers. They look ready to start punching, and Pharah clears her throat, causing them to back down. For Reaper’s part, his posture suggests he doesn’t really care, and that makes her nervous.

Once all the explosive are placed, Jack and Pharah duck behind some blast-damaged crates, giving Reaper the signal to blow it.

Just as Jack gives the signal--his gun tightening in his grip, ready to jump into action to try once more and subdue his old friend--Snowball’s digital readout turns into a klaxon and it blares a digital wharble at the space between the crates.

There, nestled under a pile of rubble, is another explosive. When had Reaper snuck it in there?

No time to ponder as Reaper’s laugh echoes, and Pharah grabs Jack’s arm while he is swearing. Her jets fire for what is the last time, as explosions tear the world apart again.

*****

Mei measures the wall where the pillar sticks out. She doesn’t have any tools, so she is eye-balling distances and hopes for the best, though Brigitte seems to have a good eye for it..

The plan is to create an exit by performing a controlled demolition. Roughly five meters up in the ceiling, a support pillar had come through a wall from some taller room nearby, rending the concrete and staying put mostly because of the ice wall holding everything in place. So long as that pillar stays where it is.

Mei creates more ice, noting that her reserves are running low, while Ana helps Brigitte look for a weak point to break free.

Everything is coming together nicely, and Mei thinks they are just about ready, when another round of explosives rips through the facility, just on the other side of the wall--where Pharah, Soldier: 76 and Reaper were last seen.

The walls rumble, and Mei is thrown to the floor, the breath stolen from her. The ceiling cracks as the pillar tears through more of the ceiling, sending concrete chunks flying. One chunk is falling over Mei, and in her confusion and panic she does nothing. Just stares at the concrete.

She expects her life to flash before her eyes, to maybe see her old colleagues from Ecopoint: Antarctica. Instead, Brigitte’s energy shield flashes into existence between Mei and the falling chunk. Instead of a clean deflect, the chunk knocks Brigitte’s arm down, and the young woman collapses to a knee next to Mei, panting and groaning. 

Her arm is twisted at an odd angle, and it is surely broken. She grins at Mei through the pain. “Time’s up, snow queen. Time to improvise!”

Ana pulls a dart from a side pouch as Brigitte uses her good arm to pull Mei to her feet. The ice walls are cracking under the new pressure, and she didn’t have time to fortify the area before they destroyed a wall.

“ _ Det som inte dödar, härdar _ ,” Brigitte says, though Mei doesn’t know its meaning. “Get me up to the pillar, Mei!” She stands ready, her broken arm limp at her side, flail retracted and making an unusual sound.

Get her up there? She nods as Ana stabs Brigitte with the dart, injecting her with something. Suddenly Brigitte almost glows with energy and she stands taller, looks stronger. She is devastatingly beautiful in the moment. 

“Good luck,” Ana says, backing away, putting her Bastet mask back on for protection.

Mei gets her balance, still struggling to breathe, and takes aim. This might be the last of her cryo solution, but she can’t use what she has left if she dies trying to conserve it.

“Ready?” Brigitte and Ana nod. Brigitte looks ready to run a cheetah down. Her feet are planted, her flail is ready.

Mei fires the blaster, overcharging the ice wall mode. Ice forms under Brigitte’s feet and then shoots up in an even plane, carrying her with it. Whatever adrenaline shot Brigitte has been injected with helps her maintain balance, and she leaps upwards at the height of the ice wall, propelling herself another two meters upward, spinning to gain momentum and orient herself to the pillar.

She throws her flail outwards and activates its Whip Shot. It flies forward like a cannonball, knocking into the unstable pillar and tearing it the rest of the way through the ceiling and wall. Chunks of concrete fly. Sparks erupt as power lines rip free of their moorings inside the walls.

Mei and Ana shelter inside the ice wall alcove, watching Brigitte with awe,  Diànmǔ* made flesh, as she drops to a roll amidst falling concrete and a shower of arcing electricity. As she lands, the wall finishes crumbling, and daylight shines in all around her. 

Brigitte favors her broken arm as Ana’s shot begins to wear off, and she drops to a knee, laughing and dripping sweat.

Ana grabs Mei’s arm and pulls her forward. “We have to help her. Nano Boost shots drain a person after.”

Mei nods and they rush forward amid smaller chunks of ceiling falling around them. They each gather up an arm, Mei being careful not to jostle Brigitte’s broken limb, and they ease through the sunlit gap in the wall.

They blink and cover their eyes as they stumble through. It feels like hours have passed, but the sun is still high in the sky and bearing down upon them.

They regroup and drag each other through the scrub and sand, the broken bits of building, looking for a shelter from the sun.

Which is when Mei remembers that there was a sniper that forced them all inside.

Suddenly through the comms, Reinhardt’s voice says, “I will tear down this entire building to get to you, Brigitte! Hold on!”

The trio collapses against an old tractor with an attached bin for hauling materials, out of sight of the most obvious sniper perches.

Mei says into the comms, “Reinhardt! Brigitte and I are safe. Have you seen Pharah? Where is the sniper?”

Ana yanks hard on Mei’s arm, pulling her down and disrupting her train of thought. “I am not here. Jack and I are not here, do you understand?”

Her Bastet mask is intimidating, and Mei nods slowly. “It will be hard to hide your presence if you are standing here when he finds us.”

Ana nods, using her scope to look around while Reinhardt blubbers and yells through the comms. 

“Pharah reporting. Snowball and I are safe.”

Mei holds her hand to her heart, turning from the others while Brigitte pants heavily in the sand. Thank goodness her team is alive. She wipes her glasses free of dust and her eyes free of tears, hoping Brigitte and Ana don’t notice. 

“Do you see Pharah and Jack?” Mei asks Ana. When Ana doesn’t respond, Mei turns to see the woman sprinting down the outskirts of the ruined building.

“She left, as soon as you turned your back,” Brigitte says between heaving breaths.

Mei watches as the woman hops into a camouflaged buggy, Soldier: 76 at the wheel. He drives off north out of the compound, then turns east, while Ana in her Bastet mask stands in her seat, saluting Mei and Brigitte.

Pharah says in the comms, “Another vehicle just tore out of here to the east, deeper inland. Probably Talon.”

Injuries. Old allies. New enemies. Destruction of property. Nothing to show for it. Mei’s first mission is a failure in all ways but absolute. She drops to the sand next to Brigitte, legs splayed out to her sides, and peels off her sweaty Overwatch jacket to make a sling.

“Not bad for your first time,” Brigitte says, wincing as the sling envelops her arm. Her shield looks completely destroyed.

“Very bad,” Mei disagrees. “The only thing that didn’t go wrong was not dying.”

“Sometimes, all you can do is stay alive, Mei. You kept your head… most of the time. You kept us alive. You came up with plans. You took out enemies.”

“But we didn’t get what we came for.” She cinches the sling and rests it against Brigitte’s stomach. 

“We came on a hope and a prayer. It was always going to be a longshot, Mei. Even before Talon showed up. Reinhardt, we get it, you’re on your way, stop yelling in the comms.”

Mei chuckles at their banter despite herself. It will be nice to have Snowball back. She was worried over it.

“Can your nanos help a broken bone?” she asks.

“Only hairline fractures. This is clean through, just like my first test flight off the roof of our home.” 

“Ouch. You did test flights?”

Brigitte sits up a little straighter, the color returning to her cheeks, her breathing returning to normal. “Turns out it is much harder to make people fly than a seven year old could put together with supplies from an arts and crafts table.”

“But you never made a flight suit for yourself?”

Brigitte shakes her head, ponytail bobbing. “Jetpacks are fun and all, but it takes someone a little more balanced to maneuver, like a certain airdancer we know.” She laughs. “Cats are also not fond of jetpacks.”

Mei laughs along with her. From the west, Reinhardt rockets in. From the east, Pharah walks towards the pair with Snowball bouncing along beside her, at least until it spots Mei, where it bounds forward and snuggles against her. Mei rubs its dome and notes the damage done to it, but Snowball appears in good spirits.

And blinking on the readout on Snowball is that hard drive icon again.

  
Footnote:   
*Diànmǔ is the Chinese Goddess of Lightning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The mission is nearly complete! Check back in a couple weeks for the aftermath.


	7. I Tried My Best

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With the mission complete and everyone alive, Mei checks the data Snowball retrieved, and feels like she has failed at being a leader. Pharah and Winston give her pep talks.

The flight back to Vancouver is quiet. Reinhardt snores, out of his armor and taking up two cots. The armor is dented and torn, but a walking rocket tank protects its wearer. Pharah helps Brigitte in the cockpit due to Brigitte’s broken arm, and Mei leaves them alone for now, hearing Pharah ask about Ana. Mei is sure Pharah will come asking about her mother soon enough, too.

She pulls her sky blue parka over her torso, enjoying the weight and warmth of her preferred gear. Next mission, she would like it to be colder.

If there is a next mission.

She sits down next to her cryoblaster gear on the deployment deck, where Snowball has docked and is recharging. It took some damage all right, but she is certain nothing internal is broken. She has yet to upload the data Snowball retrieved, and is excited to know that the mission might not have been a complete failure. What data might Atacama have been collecting after all this time? Would it be useful? Would it relate to the climate data she has collected so far?

She holds the Pachimummy patch that Pharah gave her. Pharah has never been on an Overwatch mission, so presumably she knew it was around because it was her mother’s. A gift from little Fareeha, perhaps?

Pharah comes down from the cockpit, out of her armor now, stretching and craning her neck, giving Mei a wan smile.

She says, “Auto pilot is on, she can handle it solo for a while.”

“She could probably handle it solo even without it flying for us.”

Fareeha chuckles and sits in a seat one removed from Mei. “So you talked to my mother.”

“Yes. She seemed nice.”

Fareeha shrugs. “She left Egypt without saying goodbye, so I do not know why I thought it would be any different when we accidentally run into each other halfway around the world.”

“It must be difficult, having a vigilante who everyone thought was dead for a parent.”

Fareeha laughs, leaning back into the seat. “My father is definitely the responsible one. Do you know, my mother left Egypt to chase after Talon, knowing that Egypt is in good hands so long as I am there.”

Mei nods. “It is. You are something in that flight suit, Fareeha.”

She shrugs again. “I don’t know about any of that. Things seem okay now that Bastet dismantled the preeminent criminal organization.”

Mei thinks for a moment. “There is a saying in Chinese,  _ Yǒu qí fù bì yǒu qí zǐ _ . It roughly translates to ‘ Having such a father must be such a son.’”

“Like mother, like daughter.”

“Yes, that.”

Fareeha stands and watches the sea pass below them, arms crossed. “Am I, though?”

“You could be the parts of your mother that you most admire,” Mei says. “No one has perfect parents, Fareeha. Mine do not know what to do with a daughter who is ten years younger than she is supposed to be, who was forgotten and thought dead.”

Fareeha’s shoulders stiffen. “It’s a hard thing, to be a child, sometimes.”

“Almost as hard as being a parent,” Mei says.

Fareeha laughs ruefully. “I hope you reconnect with them someday soon, Mei.”

“As do I. As you will with your mother.”

Fareeha straightens and turns back to Mei. She smiles softly, and Mei smiles back. “I think I will enjoy being your friend.”

Mei blushes and nods, avoiding eye contact with the woman. “I was just thinking the same.”

“Thanks for talking. I’m gonna get some rest.” Her eyes fall on the Pachimummy patch and she smiles one last time. “Maybe check on Brigitte? She’s strong, but willful. Doesn’t like accepting help. How could she, with Reinhardt as her mentor?”

They chuckle, but Mei says, “He is a good soldier, when he wants to be.”

“That’s all he ever wants to be, Mei.” She pats Mei’s shoulder, and Mei places her hand over Fareeha’s for a moment. “A protector.”

Mei nods, letting Fareeha’s hand go and standing up. “Get some rest.”

“Yes, sir.” They share a smile, and Fareeha disappears up to the crew deck. 

Mei pockets the Pachimummy again and walks up the steps to the flight deck, where Brigitte is leaning on her good arm, idly watching the water pass under them.

“How is your arm?” Mei asks.

“The bone is experiencing what I might call Separation Anxiety. Hurts like hell, and my nanos can only do so much.”

“We’ll be home before too long, Brigitte.”

“Couple hours, and Dr. Ziegler will have me fixed right up,” she agrees. “Then I just have to figure out how to fix my shield.”

“I built my cryoblaster, so maybe I can help.”

“Help is good,” Brigitte says. “Inspiration is better.”

Mei doesn’t really know what to say to that, but she smiles. “I’m just glad you are okay. You got hurt protecting me.”

Brigitte shrugs that off. “All in a day’s work. I’d be a poor squire to Reinhardt if I didn’t soak up some damage to keep others healthy.”

Mei perches on the console next to Brigitte and says, “Still. You say it’s just part of the job, but that doesn’t change the importance. You saved my life, multiple times. You put yourself in harm’s way at least once to do it. You hurt yourself so that I didn’t suffer. That is not just ‘part of the job’.”

Brigitte’s face reddens, amplified by her pale skin and reddish-brown hair, and she changes the subject. “So did Fareeha give you twenty questions about her mother?”

“Maybe only three. It is a strange relationship they must have.”

“If you could call it that. But at least we know she cares, even if she’s absent and globe-trotting. Sometimes I think my father cares more about his turrets and that Bastion unit than he does his family.”

Mei grimaces. “I’m sure he doesn’t.”

Brigitte shrugs, wincing at her arm. “Maybe, maybe not. He’s got a lot on his mind these days. And I can’t even tell him about Ana and Jack. It would mean so much to know they’re still out fighting, out doing good, even if they’re doing it a little differently.”

Mei stands and does the same thing Fareeha did to her: puts her hand on Brigitte’s shoulder. “When we can put down our weapons, perhaps they can, too. Until then, we can only do our best, even if that means we fall down sometimes.”

Brigitte sniffs. “Once Angela fixes my arm, we should play around with the ice walls some more, figure out how high I can go.”

“As high as our Airdancer, no doubt.” They grin at each other as Mei lets her shoulder go.

Brigitte says, “It was nice, having her here. Too bad she’ll be back in Egypt, busting terrorist skulls, after this.”

Mei isn’t so sure of that, after their conversation.

“Okay,” Mei says, “I’m going to see what Snowball picked up, maybe make this whole trip worth something. If you need help, let me or Fareeha know.”

Brigitte waves that away. “Good luck on the treasure hunt, Boss.”

Mei walks back down to the deployment deck and rubs Snowball’s dome as she sits back down.

“Wake up, sleepyhead.” It could use a little more time on the charger, but Mei is eager to see what it found.

Snowball’s digital readout blinks and scrolls a protracted  _ yaaaaawn _ as it lazily lifts out of its cradle, beeping and booping happily.

“I’ll let you recharge the rest of the way soon,” she promises, loading her holo screen interface from the cryoblaster pack. “Upload the data, and then run a comparison analysis against the Antarctica and Marsyangdi data sets. Find coherence points, if any. While you process that, I will analyze the data by itself, to see what is merely local fluctuation.”

Snowball’s digital readout shows a thumbs up emoji and then complicated lines and graphs begin flickering on its screen, while the little bot hums, as it always does when running complicated algorithms.

Mei looks over the data on the holo screen, flicking her fingers to move around and zoom in or out. There are years of collected data here, as recent as today, though the last couple of years it has only been passively collecting ambient temperatures, humidity, pressure, and comparing them year over year to same over the past.

The temperatures have increased by a minute but noticeable amount in the area, with the other relative weather variables seeming unchanged on average. That in itself proves nothing, but it is curious.

Then she notices it isn’t everywhere, but heavily concentrated to the northeast. Is that just a locational spike? In the desert, but away from the cooling effect of the Pacific Ocean. But the temperature in that area has seen a larger spike than elsewhere in previous years.

She pulls up a global image and investigates what is to the northeast, but nothing unusual presents itself; it is just more of central and northeast South America.

Snowball beeps and a new set of graphs pop up on the holo screen, indicating that there is some relevance to each data set. In all cases, the temperature has been seen to fluctuate higher (Atacama) or lower (Antarctica and Marsyangdi), without any noticeable trend in rain, wind, pressure, or other climatological variance.

Very curious. 

She needs more data, as this is proof of nothing except that something is different. It might not even be sentient-made, or harmful. But until she can gather more intelligence, she is operating in the dark.

*****

The HQ is nothing fancy. A warehouse in the shipyards on the coast of Vancouver, with a little Winston defense network flair. Luxury Freight is on the building. On paper, Overwatch is a delivery company, flying only when their rich clients dictate. Deliveries are missions. 

The team’s debriefing is protracted, but Mei feels a little better about the whole mission now that she gathered the climate data. After it is over, Mei heaves a sigh of relief as they all stand around outside the meeting room. Winston, the giant sentient ape, lumbers out of the room with his glasses and a clipboard, talking quietly with the following Dr. Angela Ziegler. He is not wearing his jump pack at the moment, but instead has a bulky lab coat. Winston releases the others to the barracks, which is just a small building-within-a-building that has its own rooms and privacy. 

Reinhardt mumbles, “There was a time I would grab a stein and head to the brewery in celebration. Now I just want to soak my aching back. Little Brigitte, make sure you take care of your arm, okay?”

“Of course,  _ Gudfader _ . Dr. Ziegler will have a robot arm ready in no time at all.”

Reinhardt’s eyes widen and Brigitte laughs. “Go on, ya big goof. She’ll set it and get the regenerative stuff mending the break in no time.”

“Maybe not no time,” Angela Ziegler says. With platinum blond hair and a lab coat over a stylish yellow frock, she is as beautiful and ageless as she appeared to be 10 years ago, the last time Mei saw her before her cryo event. Whether this is just good makeup or medical science, Mei is too embarrassed to ask.

“Come along, Agent Lindholm.” She stops and laughs. “I never thought I’d be saying that about anybody but your father, Brigitte.”

“Glad to be a trip down memory lane, Doc. I’ll catch you later, Fareeha. You’re not leaving for Egypt until tomorrow, right?”

Fareeha nods, standing awkwardly away from the group until Reinhardt, Angela, and Brigitte go off to tend aching and broken bones.

“And you, Pharah,” Winston says, “your um, chest, looks like it is bleeding. Do you need to see Angela as well?”

Fareeha looks down to see that there are in fact a couple spots of red on her blouse. “Hazards of getting a shotgun blast to the chest.” She pulls the collar of her blouse out and looks down, inspecting the wounds. “No, Brigitte’s nanos did their job well enough. The foreign material has finally finished pushing out, and now it is merely scabbing over.”

“Gross,” Winston says under his breath, and Mei stifles a giggle. “Well, I have to say it was a treat having you visit, though next time maybe Reinhardt won’t blurt out the very secret nature of Overwatch’s return.”

“I am glad he did,” Mei says, “Fareeha was invaluable both as a scout and a fighter. She saved me from death at least twice.”

“Three times, but who’s counting?” Fareeha nudges Mei with an elbow. “But I would like to talk to you some more, Winston, about what you’re doing here. When you have a minute.”

“Of course. Mei, would you upload the data to the servers here while I have a quick chat with Pharah?”

Mei nods, feeling suddenly dismissed without talking about the mission and her role in it. As she goes to walk to the science lab, which is just a corner of the warehouse with her supplies in it, Winston clears his throat.

“We still have to have your leadership debriefing,” he says, looking downcast. Mei nods again, feeling like she is going to be reprimanded, and turns away to upload the data.

It doesn’t take long, and she busies herself by working on repairs to her cryoblaster gear, and removing Snowball’s outer shell to hammer and buff out the dings and scratches. It is still in sleep mode, so it doesn’t get bothered at all while she does this.

Halfway through the buffing process, Winston and Fareeha leave the meeting hall once again, and shake hands as Fareeha walks toward Mei. Winston waves Mei forward once more, and Mei meets Fareeha halfway.

“Going to see your father tonight?” Mei asks.

“It will be difficult to do that while I am having a drink with you and Brigitte.”

“A drink? I’m not really much of a drinker.”

“Neither am I, but those Lindholms can sure drop a mug or three. Think about it, okay? If Brigitte’s up to it, I’d like us all to have a toast.”

Mei’s shoulders slump. “Toasting to the bare minimum of success…”

“You keep saying that, but you did well, Mei. You are going to be fine. We will toast something else, I promise.”

Mei nods and plods over to Winston, standing in front of the meeting room. Fareeha goes off to find Brigitte and be best friends.

“Is this where you tell me all the ways I messed up, and that I am not born for leadership?”

Winston’s eyes widen and his brow furrows. “Is that your assessment of this mission?”

Mei shrugs. “It went wrong in a lot of ways. All we brought back besides some nebulous data are some crates with various electronics that hadn’t exploded. Oh, and the place exploded.”

“Take a walk with me, Mei.” Winston doesn’t wait for Mei to follow as he trots off toward the hangar bay, which is just a loading dock retrofitted for wider vehicles to pass through.

She follows, muttering in Chinese. Winston walks them past her science lab and stops beside it.

“What are you working on, when it isn’t collecting this climate data?” he asks.

She stares at him a moment, confused. “I--This is everything I am doing.”

“When you tinker on Snowball, or make modifications to your equipment?”

“They are improvements. They help me perform the mission. Why do you ask?”

Winston picks up the half-buffed dome and inspects it, then sets it down. “Let’s keep going.”

“But Winston--” He doesn’t listen and keeps walking, over to the hangar, where some young volunteers unload the crates Mei’s team brought back.

They are chatting animatedly about the mission, and Winston invites Mei to listen in.

“Did you see Reinhardt’s helmet? It was smashed in so much, it looked like he should have a dent in his head.”

“What about Pharah’s chestplate? It’s basically blood and shrapnel, but she’s still walking around like it’s a papercut.”

“And Brigitte’s arm? She’s so brave, protecting others.”

Mei listens and gets more morose as they list off the damage. “Why are you making me listen to them talk about what went wrong?”

“I’m not, Mei. That’s what you’re missing. These two are talking about how incredible it is that you all lived. That the worst injury is a broken bone.”

“But how is that a positive?”

“People die on missions, Mei. The mortality rate for Overwatch was pretty high back when I was first joining, around 10%.”

10%. That’s so high. “One out of ten didn’t come back from a mission. And it usually was not the fault of the leader of the strike team. War zones and hostage situations and terror attacks and bank heists... These are dangerous, unpredictable places. You walked into a situation that we failed to properly identify as a threat, and you managed to walk everyone back out of it.”

10%, she thinks. If she leads another mission, she’d be responsible for three or four more lives again. Each one a ten percent chance.

She starts to breathe rapidly, hyperventilating. The reality that she can’t count on two hands the number of times she was almost murdered today sinks in. Ten percent.

“I--I’m not a combat leader, Winston. I’m not trained for it.”

“Hey, it’s okay. Listen to my voice, Mei. Hear me when I say that you did a good job. We’re all trying to figure out what’s what with this new organization. I was the youngest member of Overwatch when it ended, and now I’m Strike Commander simply because there is no one else to do it. You’re just a scientist, as you like to say, but you’re so much more than that.”

“But I’m not. Winston, I tried my best today, I did everything I could, and all I ended up doing was getting people hurt having to protect me.”

“I don’t know how else to put this. That is their job. You didn’t have to engage in combat as the scientific leader, but you did. You took down hostiles. You stood up against Reaper and  _ didn’t die _ . Those things matter, Mei. They matter a lot.”

“But not if the mission doesn’t yield results.”

“It did. You made a difference. You made decisions that helped you escape. You used complex math to design a way free of a blocked room, and then executed that plan under unexpected duress.”

“It was mostly Brigitte,” Mei says.

“It wasn’t mostly her. It was your plan, your direction, your ice wall that enabled Brigitte to save you all. She gets the glory, but you get the credit.”

I get the credit… “I--I really did a good job? You’re not just trying to spare my feelings?”

“Promise on a jar of peanut butter if you like. One of the industrial sizes from a big box store.”

Mei laughs at his poor joke. The two young volunteers quieted down once they realized they were being observed by the leader, and they silently invoice the contents of the boxes now.

“So you are not a great leader yet,” Winston says, licking his lips. He is probably thinking about peanut butter. “But you can get there, if you want. You just have to retrain your expectations. Leaders make mistakes. Leaders hesitate. Leaders don’t always have the information they need, or they operate under bias. Every leader is different, and it takes failure to grow. It takes frustration to learn.”

“It takes a village,” Mei says.

“It takes a village,” Winston repeats, “to forge a leader. Jack Morrison wasn’t born just ready to lead people into danger. He was brought up into it. He served. He learned.”

She doesn’t engage with the Jack Morrison talk, since Winston doesn’t know he’s alive. “And you want me to be that.”

Winston’s head shakes. “Heavens, no. I want you to be the best at what you think will serve Overwatch best. If that’s just a scientist with a penchant for dangerous missions, then you need to be able to fight. You need to be able to lead.”

“And you think I can.”

He nods. “If you want it, you can make it happen. Mei, you are a brilliant scientist, and your charisma is only stifled by your lack of ego.”

Mei fights a blush and looks away, realizing as she does that this is exactly what Winston is talking about.

“You’re confident in the lab, and you can be confident in the field, too. We can work on it, if you like.”

She nods, tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “Maybe next time I propose a mission, we do more recon?”

Winston smiles. “That’s a good start. A leader is only as good as the intelligence she has. I’ll do my best to support you, if you’ll promise to try leadership again.”

She screws up her courage and looks Winston in the eyes, salutes him, and smiles back. “Yes, Sir. You--you can count on me.”

Winston leaves her at the edge of the hangar bay, and she isn’t sure how to fold in all this advice. 

Before she can do more than think about it, Snowball makes a series of digital screeches that send Mei into overdrive. She turns and rushes back to her corner science lab, only to discover the little bot is desperately trying to put its dome back on its body, but without hands or clamps, it is unable to do more than flip the dome onto its body and sit there awkwardly. 

Its screen has a pair of embarrassed eyes and blushing cheeks, and Mei laughs. She shouldn’t, but the little goofball has been especially precious since they joined Overwatch.

“Come here, Snowball. I need to finish buffing that before we put you right.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's just one chapter left in the Ecopoint Atacama mission, and it'll be more of an epilogue and a taste of things to come. If you enjoy Mei learning to be a leader, and the friendships she's forming, you'll like the continuing missions of the new Overwatch!


	8. We Are In This Together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The mission complete, Mei and Fareeha go out for a celebratory drink and to discuss the future.

Mei walks into the pub, at the edge of the shipyards, to find it mostly empty. This is not entirely surprising, she thinks, because it is a Sunday night and the world is preparing for another busy week.

Fareeha is at the bar in a red blouse--one that isn’t bloody--and a pair of trousers. She is talking animatedly with the male bartender until she sees Mei and waves her over.

Mei is not really a barfly type, but she goes up and sits down next to Fareeha.

“Mmm,” Fareeha says, eyeing Mei up and down, “I am going to order you a drink, and then we will see if it suits you, yes?”

Mei nods, feeling self-conscious and underdressed in a Summer Games tee that is a little loose around the collar. She is glad there is no one else around.

Fareeha whispers something to the bartender, and Mei says, “I was sorry to see Brigitte couldn’t come.”

Fareeha shrugs. “She wouldn’t be able to drink, anyway. Broken bones still take time to mend even with Angela’s skills and equipment.”

“Dr. Ziegler is very persistent in care regimen,” Mei agrees.

Fareeha chuckles. “It’s very strange to hear her called that, you know.”

“I was never friendly with her, before. She was younger than me when I went into cryo, and now she is older and wiser.”

“Was it weird answering to someone younger than you?” Fareeha asks.

“Not really,” Mei says, thinking back. Angela Ziegler was always a professional, and she handled her role as the Junior Board member for the Science Division with all the seriousness it deserved. 

“But I also did not interact with her much at all. My deployment to Antarctica was the last time I talked to her, and she was just passing on approvals and paperwork for the board.” 

The bartender slides two drinks in front of the ladies, amber-colored and wafting a hint of orange. Fareeha hands one to Mei and takes the other up.

“I promised you we would be toasting something, I believe.”

“Health, wealth, and happiness?” Mei suggests, instantly regretting it. 

Fareeha smiles. “Only two of those are important and they both start with ‘H’.”

Fareeha holds her glass, spinning the drink slowly and breathing in its scent. “This is called the Adonis. It is not my favorite, but I enjoy a good mix regardless. And that is what I think of the new Overwatch.”

The conversational pivot sideswipes Mei, and she almost spills her drink. “Not your favorite?” she asks.

“It is a good mix, Mei. You are not a traditional leader, but neither are you a bad one. Brigitte and Angela are unorthodox in their methods, to say the very least, but when it comes to protection and wellness, there aren’t many better. Reinhardt is old school, and Brigitte is new. Everything has a balance. Everything works, even if it seems it shouldn’t.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Mei says, wanting to stop her new friend from complimenting her further, but Fareeha tuts her.

“Not yet, lush,” she teases. “I want to toast myself, because I have decided I’m joining Overwatch.”

Mei had briefly considered that was a possibility, but it still takes her by surprise and she lets out a small “Oh…”

She recovers when Fareeha gives her a sour look, and holds her glass up. “Overwatch is lucky to have you, Fareeha.”

“Damn right they are.” They clink their glasses and take a drink. Mei sips hers and makes a face, to which Fareeha laughs. “Maybe the Adonis is not for you. Too bitter?”

“Too sweet,” Mei says. “If I wanted dessert, I’d order cheesecake.”

“Too sweet,” Fareeha repeats, “just like you.”

This causes a deep crimson flush to spread over Mei’s face, though it could also be the alcohol. She is not much of a drinker.

“Oh, she blushes!” Fareeha teases again. While the bartender is busily watching futbol, some match across the ocean, Fareeha snags a small bottle of bitters from behind the bartop, and dumps a few more drops into Mei’s drink. She quietly puts the bitters back and stirs Mei’s drink for her.

“Try it again. To new friendships?”

They clink glasses one more time and drink. Mei lets the cocktail mingle around her tongue, finding she deeply enjoys the orange bitters cutting the sweetness. She takes a larger sip and sets it down, smiling at Fareeha.

“You are very good at this,” she says. 

“Adding more bitters is hardly a revelation, Mei.”

Mei frowns. “No. Not that.” She takes another sip and relishes the complex tapestry. “Though you undersell the importance of that, as well.”

“What am I good at, then?” Fareeha asks, running her finger along the rim of her glass idly. Mei gets the impression that she knows exactly what she is good at. A confident woman is the product of a confident mother, and who was more confident and skilled than Ana Amari?

“Making friends, putting people at ease.”

Fareeha shrugs. “Hard to grow up any different when all your heroes are your glorified aunts and uncles.”

“It must be difficult, living up to that. Is that why you’re joining Overwatch now?”

Mei realizes after the words are out, that this is a very personal question, and she stumbles over an apology before Fareeha smiles.

“It’s okay, Mei. It could be? I admit I was crushed when I found out my mother was dead, but in the last few years of her life, she had changed. She wasn’t the mother she used to be. Would you believe that I found the disgrace and fall of Overwatch harder to bear?”

They take drinks while the silence fills between them. 

“It sounds hard,” Mei says. “In a way, they helped raise you, right?”

Fareeha nods. “It’s all silt at the bottom of the Nile now.”

When Mei stares confused for a moment, Fareeha chuckles again. “Water under the bridge?”

“That one I know.”

“When my mother was part of Overwatch, she forbade me from joining, or even taking steps to join. Maybe she saw the end coming before anyone else, I don’t know. And by the time I was ready to do it anyway, she was ‘dead’ and Overwatch had disbanded.”

“Seeing Reinhardt must have been a mix of emotions,” Mei says.

“It was. Do you know, he was in the marketplace haggling over the price of bratwurst when I heard his booming voice? Never in a million years did I expect to find him, working for a new, secret Overwatch. And it has a long way to go, doesn’t it?”

“Shipyards are a strange place for an HQ,” Mei agrees.

“So yeah, I guess I saw my opportunity. To do something good, not just for my people, my country, but for the whole world. To carve my name into the tombstone next to Jack Morrison, Angela Ziegler, Reinhardt Wilhelm, and even Mei-Ling Zhou.”

Mei does spill her drink now in her flustered haste to take another gulp. “Oh, you are not going to include me. I was just a scientist, working under the direction of Overwatch.”

“Hey, take the compliment, Mei.”

The bartender comes over to run a rag over the spill. “Sorry, very sorry,” Mei says.

“One more round, but double up the bitters on hers, okay?” Fareeha asks. The bartender nods, then seems confused that the bitters are out of place.

“You were and are a member of a group I idolized,” Fareeha continues. “Just because you weren’t out shooting mob bosses or brokering peace talks between foreign nations doesn’t mean you weren’t an integral member of the team.”

“Okay, okay,” Mei says, fighting the reddening face once more. “I accept the compliment. Now maybe you can accept one, too.”

“I’m always ready for praise,” Fareeha says, puffing up her chest in mock arrogance.

Mei isn’t sure she knows quite how to say it, but she tries. “We’ve known each other for only a couple of days, and I was your commanding officer for most of today. But really I am just happy to have become your friend. Everyone is kind and thoughtful, and all their hearts are in the right place, but they’re colleagues. Allies.”

Fareeha puts a hand out and clasps Mei’s hand. Mei squeezes the hand, unsure if that’s appropriate.

Mei says, “I’m glad you have decided to stay, is what I mean. That is maybe selfish.”

Fareeha smiles, letting Mei’s hand go. “It isn’t selfish, Mei-Mei.” Mei grins at that. “That’s right, I gave you a nickname.”

“Can--can I call you Reeha?” Mei asks, trying to prevent the tears from forming.

“I would love that.”

She raises her glass, and Mei does the same. “To many successful missions, and maybe a hungover sleepover every now and then.”

“To new friends and allies,” Mei says, and they drink.

 

Epilogue

 

The Talon meeting has gone miserable so far. Sombra knows better than to show up in person to these things, as she happens to know she is on the kill list for a couple of them.

But Doomfist, Moira, Widowmaker, Reaper, and some other operatives who are mere flunkies at this point, make up the room. Doomfist leads the discussion, debriefing Widow and Reaper on their successful mission to fact find and waylay the fledgling new Overwatch.

Widowmaker sets the hard light device down and says, “It turns out that dear Moira was correct. The scientists at Atacama were gathering evidence when they were decommissioned, and I believe Sombra’s tool wiped all traces of their investigation after it copied.”

Doomfist cracks the knuckles on his non-gauntleted hand. “This is good. We should have no trouble staying ahead of the ape and his little upstarts now. What about the conflict between the vigilantes?”

Reaper huffs. “Old ghosts who haven’t figured out they’re dead yet.”

Moira says, “If you spent more time on shooting people and less on snappy one-liners, we’d have far more bodies and far fewer groans.”

“If you spent less time berating people and more time being a scientist, maybe I wouldn’t be a shadow.”

“All the same,” Doomfist says, interrupting the fight before it can break out. “We need to figure out how they tracked you, if it came from us or from the new brats.”

“My money is on Reaper,” Sombra says through her headset. Keep them fighting each other. Always keep the conflict going.

“My  _ guns _ are on you,” he shoots back.

“Enough,” Doomfist says. “Sombra, identify the cause of the tracking, if you can. I want a report by morning.”

“If there’s surveillance footage, I’ll find it,” she says. She doesn’t really intend to do anything of the sort.

“Are we ready for the Rio job?” Widowmaker asks. “I do so wish to visit the big statue.”

Doomfist considers, and nods. “If we can confirm that Overwatch doesn’t know about the hard-light yet, we can proceed. I do not wish to tangle with them if we can help it, but if we have to blow the place to keep them from catching up, so be it.”

Everyone nods and Doomfist dismisses them. Sombra disconnects and stares at the blank screen for a moment. She has so much incriminating evidence, if only she could figure out a way to leverage it without getting caught in the crossfire of a conflict that has been brewing for a decade.

The world isn’t ready for what Vishkar Industries is planning. Only Talon stands ready to dismantle it. Overwatch has no chance in this new cynical hellscape. They would have been better off just rebranding, but the masses like a symbol.

Let Talon be that symbol.

The symbol of fear overcome. Of bonds broken. Of tides changing. 

Let Talon dig its claws in, to save the world from itself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's the end of this mission! Come on back in a couple weeks to see Mei's next mission, where she'll continue leading and trying her best. Other characters will show up, and the fight will continue. Hope everyone enjoys my take on the new Overwatch!


End file.
